“But solid food is for
the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish
good from evil.” -- Hebrews 5:14 ”

There’s a rumor going
around that dead folks are coming to life again, the blind see, the sick
are getting healed, amputees are
even growing new limbs, all due to the supernatural healing powers of
Canadian faith-evangelist Todd Bentley. Some believe there’s a “Holy
Spirit breakout” going on at the “Lakeland Outpouring.” Fresh Fire
Ministries is behind the so-called revival. The burning question for the
Fresh Fire team is, where’s the flesh? Doubting Thomas’s would like to
hear a couple of the prior dead stand up and give their testimonies. One
verifiable testimony would help.

Here’s another question:
Why hasn’t Oprah invited one of the 30 plus people Bentley claims have
passed over to the other side, then suddenly reentered their bodies due
to his “God-given” healing powers, onto her daytime show. Her audience
would eat it up!

My final question is for
the Christian who believes Todd Bentley hung the moon and stars: Are you
serious?

Unfortunately untold
thousands of professing Christians are unaware of the Apostle Paul’s
warning to the church at Thessalonica regarding “counterfeit miracles,
signs and wonders.” (The King James translation says “power and signs
and lying wonders.”) Something shady was going on in Paul’s day or he
wouldn’t have thought it necessary to bring it up. Many of the
“miracles” were not from God, but from a very cunning source: the Prince
of Darkness.

Jesus himself used harsh
words for those who dine with the devil:

“You belong to your
father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He
was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there
is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he
is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). As the saying goes, the
devil is in the details.

The Bible records true
miraculous signs and wonders in both the Old and New Testaments. For
example, Jesus physically fed a hungry crowd of 5,000 with barely 5
loaves and 2 fish -- and there were leftovers! (John 6:1-14) The
apostles, on the other hand, fed people the Gospel of Jesus Christ!

Another example is
recorded in Acts 14:3:

“So Paul and Barnabas
spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who
confirmed the message of his grace by enabling them to do miraculous
signs and wonders.”

Note that legitimate
miracles confirm the message of God’s grace. What was the message
Barnabas and Paul brought? (My comments in brackets.)

"We aare bringing you good
news [of salvation through Jesus Christ], telling you to turn from these
worthless things to the living God, who made heaven and earth and sea
and everything in them” (Acts 14:15).

Further, Luke writes in
Acts 14:21-22 that Barnabas and Paul, “preached the good news [of
salvation through Jesus Christ] in that city and won a large number of
disciples. Then they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch,
strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the
faith. ‘We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,’
they said.”

This theme runs through
the entire New Testament. Christians must go through many hardships to
get to heaven. Yet you won’t hear this sort of “negativity” from those
who preach the “prosperity gospel.” Perhaps someone should mention this
passage to Joel Osteen who has been criticized for preaching
“Christianity lite.” (The Word of Faith movement is out of the scope of
this commentary. For more on the damage word-faith teachers have
wrought, listen to the host of CrosstalkAmerica.com, Ingrid Schlueter,
interview evangelist Justin Peters. You will hear actual sound bites
featuring Creflo Dollar, who believes that Christians are little ‘gods’;
Gloria Copeland, who claims that Christians can control the weather; and
Benny Hinn, who believes that it is as easy to receive healing as it is
to receive forgiveness for sin.”[1])

In my commentary “Bam!
Bam! Bam! said the false prophet”[2] I exposed Todd
Bentley as a fool and a fraud. Not surprisingly I received a large
number of email from Christians who accused me of judging him. Several
emailers claimed they’ve been to the Lakeland Outpouring, thus they feel
they’re experts on what’s happening there. Because I haven’t
“experienced” the “move of the Holy Spirit” first hand, I have no
business “judging” Bentley. Which is like saying that those who haven’t
been to Afghanistan or Iraq shouldn’t express their opinion on the war.
That’s ridiculous! The greater a Christian leader’s responsibility, the
greater his/her accountability. Judging is not only permissible, it is
every Christian’s duty. But that fact has not stopped some “protectors
of the prophet” from being put out with me. And so I received this dire
warning: “Touch not the Lord’s anointed!” What do they mean by that
threat? Critics must keep their hands off word-faith teachers. Which is
ludicrous on its face since it’s scriptural to expose false teachers and
abusive pastors.

Mike Oppenheimer, Let Us
Reason Ministries, says the word touch means physical harm, and
what it does not mean is stating something about a person that’s true.

“How do we know this?”
Mike asks. “Because that's exactly what David did about Saul. It was
David who said he would not harm God’s anointed, who was King Saul at
the time but He spoke out publicly about him.” In speaking out against
Saul’s disobedience, Samuel also ‘touched God's anointed.’

Mike continues:

“God told Saul to ‘Smite
Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not...’
(1 Sam. 15:3). But instead, he spoke a half truth and ‘spared the best
of the sheep and of the oxen, to sacrifice unto the Lord...’ (v.15).
Samuel said it was rebellion like witchcraft and idolatry (v.24).
Because he did not obey the Word of the Lord he would be removed being
king. Saul admitted he feared the people and obeyed their voice. What a
crucial thing to learn of Saul who was God's anointed.”[3]

I responded to my critics
by saying that my marching orders come from the King! As such, I will
continue speaking publicly about Todd Bentley’s unscriptural theology.
My mission is to expose Christian liberalism and the influential
“Christians” who are leading the undiscerning into neo paganism. Ever
wonder why professing Christians say they’re “spiritual” instead of
religious? It’s because they’ve strayed from the straight and narrow
path and are following the path of the mystics! In other words, they’ve
strayed from historic orthodox Christianity and now embrace beliefs
acquired from Eastern mysticism! As a result of the
Progressive
Christianity movement, liberalism and occult practices have made
their way into mainline churches. Two examples are “Christian yoga” and
contemplative prayer. The trouble with progressives is that they claim
to know God yet they deny one or more of the fundamental doctrines of
the faith, thus making them apostates!

Pastors are commanded to
preach the “whole counsel of God.” (Acts 20:27) Church orthodoxy must
hold it’s preachers accountable for preaching the entire Bible,
including the doctrine of hell. Pastors today preach what people like to
hear, so as not to offend anyone. Why are their words and teaching not
being examined and grievous errors brought to light? And by the way, it
is scriptural to scrutinize the teaching of public figures and those in
Church leadership, especially pastors and Bible teachers. The Bereans
were paid a high compliment for checking on Paul’s teaching:

“Now the Bereans were of
more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the
message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to
see if what Paul said was true” (Acts 17:11).

For those who haven’t read
my commentary, I included a number of video clips that show Bentley’s
disgusting stage show. After seeing his ungodly behavior and hearing his
wacky stories people can decide for themselves if Todd Bentley is (a)
spirit-filled, (b) a huckster, (c) demon possessed.

It’s not like Christians
haven’t been warned about hucksters. The Apostle Peter said of these
people:

“But there were also false
prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among
you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the
sovereign Lord who bought them?bringing swift destruction on themselves.
Many will follow theiir shameful ways and will bring the way of truth
into disrepute. In their greed these teachers will exploit you with
stories they have made up. Their condemnation has long been hanging over
them, and their destruction has not been sleeping” (2 Peter 2:1-3).

It’s true that I didn’t
attend the Lakeland Outpouring. However, many other credible people can
bear witness to what’s going on -- and the videos don’t lie! There’s one
story I found particularly heart wrenching. Probably because the man
involved is a strong proponent of Intelligent Design and has been
marginalized and persecuted for opposing Darwinian evolution. He was
even fired from Baylor College for “endangering Baylor's scholarly
reputation.” The irony is, Baylor’s a Christian college!

William A. Dembski is
research professor of philosophy at Southwestern Baptist Theological
Seminary. He is also a senior fellow with Discovery Institute’s Center
for Science and Culture as well as the executive director of the
International Society for Complexity, Information, and Design. Recently
Bill Dembski took his wife and three children on the 130-mile drive to
Todd Bentley's "impartation service" in Denton, Texas. Dembski has twin
7-year-old boys, one of whom is autistic. His friends urged him to
attend the meeting for the boy’s “miraculous healing.” If God wanted to
use Todd Bentley, the Dembski’s were open to it.

Following is Bill
Dembski’s story from an article he wrote about his experience in Denton,
“Faith & healing -- Where's the evidence?”[4] (All
Dembski quotes are from this article.)

The Dembski family arrived
at the arena in Denton at 7 p.m., just in time to watch Keith Miller,
the chief organizer of Stand Firm World Ministries, kick things off:

“After prompting the
audience to perform ritualistic acts of worship (stand up, raise your
hands, say after me ...), he passed the baton to a young woman singer
and her backup band. The sound system was terrible -- sounds were loud
and distorted. The music was repetitive in the extreme. In almost two
hours of this "music ministry," only a handful of songs were sung, and
many of them seemed to consist of only one or two phrases.”

The sick come from all
over the world to receive healing and end up spending hours enduring
ritualistic worship and having to listen to loud and distorted music? I
think I know why. Some revivalist preachers use music to get people into
an altered state of consciousness. New Ager and professional hypnotist,
Dick Sutphen, has studied hypnosis for over 30 years and has become so
skilled at his trade that he trains other hypnotists. (I do not endorse
Sutphen’s books or recommend his website.) Here’s what he says about how
some revivalist preachers work:

“Go to the church or tent
early and sit in the rear, about three-quarters of the way back. Most
likely repetitive music will be played while the people come in for the
service. A repetitive beat, ideally ranging from 45 to 72 beats per
minute (a rhythm close to the beat of the human heart), is very hypnotic
and can generate an eyes-open altered state of consciousness in a very
high percentage of people. And, once you are in an alpha state, you are
at least 25 times as suggestible as you would be in full beta
consciousness. The music is probably the same for every service, or
incorporates the same beat, and many of the people will go into an
altered state almost immediately upon entering the sanctuary.
Subconsciously, they recall their state of mind from previous services
and respond according to the post-hypnotic programming.”

Sadly, some revivalist
preachers are well aware of the physiological results.

More from Bill Dembski:

“Finally, around 9 p.m.
Bentley began to speak. He devoted much of his message to the visions he
has received and the miracles he claims have happened in his ministry.
Then, almost as an afterthought, he spent a few minutes preaching from
the Bible (John 5). In fact, he admitted that he was having us open the
Bible simply so that it couldn't be said that he didn't preach from the
Bible. So much for reverencing the Scriptures.”

It is evident that Bentley
does not hold a high view of Scripture. Listen to enough of his bizarre
stories and you will see that he has little regard for Church doctrine.
One such proof is the alleged angelic visitations he speaks of so often.
Not only are his stories unscriptural, the man instructs his audience in
blatant occultism! His angelic visitors allegedly give him advice about
all sorts of things, from finances to healing. Does he offer a biblical
precedent for what he passes off as coming from God’s servants? No! And
that’s because he would be hard pressed to find anything close to what
he asserts in regards to his so-called angelic visitations. The fact is
that very little is known about angels simply because God wants it that
way.

Due to Bentley’s
unscriptural interaction with angels a brief lesson in Angelology 101 is
essential. From Scripture we learn that there are elect holy angels and
fallen angels. In either case they are powerful supernatural spirit
beings without gender, but on occasion they manifest in human form --
every time as males, never as females. Some elect holy angels are
messengers of God. The class of angel called Seraphim, or seraph,
minister to Almighty God and proclaim His glory. (Isaiah 6:1-7)
Cherubim, or cherub, are the second highest rank, below the Seraphim,
who guarded the east side of the Garden of Eden with "a flaming sword
flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life"
(Gen.3:24). Also mentioned is Michael the Archangel who is the commander
and leads celestial armies. Michael is considered to be the champion of
God’s people and a fighter against heresies. But by far the most
notorious angel is Lucifer, called Satan after the fall. Satan is the
commander of the fallen angels, or demons. The Bible says of Satan:

“The coming of the lawless
one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds
of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, and in every sort of evil
that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused
to love the truth and so be saved” (2 Thessalonians 2:8-10).

Satan and his demons have
the power to deceive people by counterfeiting miracles. Only those who
refuse to love the truth will be deceived. Do not be deceived!

“Do not let anyone who
delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you for
the prize. Such a person goes into great detail about what he
has seen, and his unspiritual mind puffs him up with idle notions.
He has lost connection with the Head, from whom the whole body,
supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God
causes it to grow” (Colossians 2:18-19).

For a biblical analysis on
angels read my commentary “Beware of Angels From The Dark Side.”[5]

Many in the Body of Christ
are biblically illiterate; hence they lack spiritual discernment, which
is why preachers like Todd Bentley get away with teaching rank heresy!
Christians are commanded to practice sound judgment. But how is that
possible when they are woefully ignorant of what the Bible teaches?
There is only one way to know if someone’s teaching is true or false:
Study the Bible!

Progressives have mounted
an all out assault on the validity of the Bible. Why? They want to
remove the only source of real truth. Who’s behind it? Our adversary the
devil! His goal is to rid the world of the Book that conveys God’s
redemptive plan to fallen humanity. Listen to what Paul says about the
Bible:

"All Scripture is
God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and
training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly
equipped for every good work" (2 Timothy 3:16).

God-breathed means “given
by inspiration of God.” The Bible is the foundation of truth for faith
and practice. Moreover, it is a training tool for Christians -- the only
valid training manual!

But I digress.

Returning to the Dembski
family’s horrific experience at the “impartation service,” Bill reports
what happened next:

”Nowhere in Bentley's
message did I see an emphasis on the love and compassion of God -- that
healing is an expression of God's goodness and care for humanity.
Rather, the emphasis throughout was on power -- the power to heal and be
healed.

”Bentley told stories of
remarkable healings. In fact, he claims that in his ministry 30 people
have now been raised from the dead. Are these stories credible? A common
pattern in his accounts of healing was an absence of specificity.
Bentley claims that one man, unembalmed, had been dead for 48 hours and
was in a coffin. When the family gathered around at a funeral home, the
man knocked from inside the coffin to be let out.

”But what are the
specifics? Who was this man? What's his name? Where's the death
certificate? And why not parade the man at Bentley's meetings? If I am
ever raised from the dead through anyone's ministry, you can be sure
I'll put in a guest appearance. Bentley claims that he is having a team
investigate healings performed under his ministry and will soon go
public with the evidence. I look forward to seeing it.”

I’m sorry to say that a
large number of Christians don’t care to know the specifics. Instead
they choose to believe the lie because it’s far easier than digging for
the truth -- and who has the time for that?!

What Dembski reports next
is profoundly disturbing. He explains that after Bentley “preached,” an
offering was taken. During the offering he asked the crowd:

“’How much anointing do
you want to receive?’ Thus he linked the blessing we should receive with
the amount of money we gave.”

After the money was in the
coffer, Bentley said a mass healing prayer. You can almost hear Bill
Dembski’s somber tone as he makes mention of all the people who came
forward because they believed they were healed. An eyewitness to the
event, Bill says he saw “no obvious or dramatic evidence of healing.” He
and his wife went to Denton with an open mind, hopeful of receiving
healing for their young son, even expecting to see mass healings, yet
they saw no obvious evidence of healing through the self-professed
faith-healer. Still, they stayed on.

Following the prayer for
mass healing, Bentley told the crowd he would pray for the severest
cases. What happened next is beyond belief:

”At this point, a friend
who was with us urged that she and my wife take our son with autism down
for prayer (I stayed with our other son and daughter). Over an hour
later my son with autism was still not able to get to the main floor for
prayer. Ushers twice prevented that from happening. They noted that he
was not in a wheelchair. Wheelchair cases clearly had priority --
presumably they provided better opportunities for the cameras, which
filmed everything. They also invoked the fire marshals, who, they
claimed, prohibited too many people on the floor of the arena. But
earlier in the service, during the worship time, they had packed the
floor with people singing and whooping it up.”

Sometime after midnight
the discouraged Dembski family exited the arena. Their son was refused
prayer twice because “he did not look the part.” But their son’s
situation was not unique:

”A man with bone cancer
and his wife traveled a long distance, were likewise refused prayer, and
left in tears. People with needs were shortchanged. It seemed that
power, prestige and money (in that order) were dominating motives behind
the meeting. Minimal time was given to healing, though plenty was
devoted to assaulting our senses with blaring insipid [hypnotic] music
and even to Bentley promoting and selling hi s own products (books and
CDs).

”Neither my wife nor I
regret going. It was an education. Our kids are resilient. But the ride
home raised a question. We found ourselves avoiding talking about the
event until the children fell asleep. Then, as they drifted off in the
early morning, we talked in hushed tones about how easily religion can
be abused, in this case to exploit our family. What do we tell our
children? I'm still working on that one.”

How many other people are
working on that one?

One last comment. The
reason Christianity is in the sorry state it’s in is because Christians
fail to accurately handle the Word of Truth. Too often they look for an
“experience” and ignore the power of God's Word, which convicts the
world of sin, righteousness and impending judgment. For the sincere
Christian who wants to know good from evil, the Bible, not man, has the
answers. Read it until the pages are dog-eared.